The Case for Bernie - from an Expat

It's difficult sometimes to get perspective on how far our country has fallen.

- from - expat.

“ … in Germany most of the year.

Every year for more than three weeks in August, I travel to the US to visit family and friends.

just spent … three weeks in …Colorado.

I have a generous amount of paid vacation time,

mandated by the German government

(something Bernie supports, …).
By now most of us are familiar with what Sanders means when he calls himself a 'democratic socialist'.
He insists that the US, one of the wealthiest nations in the world,

can afford to provide its workers with paid vacation time, with

universal health care,

free college education

…

He knows that we have the wealth to improve our nation's infrastructure—

every time I return to the US, I'm horrified by how dilapidated this country has become.

… Republicans are committed to obstructing social progress. - … this attitude reflects just

how far we have fallen,

how far right our discourse has gone,

how deeply disconnected we are from the rest of the world,

Europeans, … view the US with a combination of

horror,

disgust ,

sympathy.

They fundamentally do not understand how we still do not have

single-payer health care,

strong public education - through specialty training or university education and beyond,

unemployment benefits,

job-placement

paid retraining services,

paid parental leave,

pensions,

and more (much more!). - - …
it should be obvious to all that without a fundamental change of the role of

Wall Street and corporate power in our nation,

none of the social values (we) should support will be realized.
So when you tell me that these "socialist" values are not realistic,

and that most Americans won't vote for them,

I'll tell you that the only way to bring this country back from the abyss the right has taken us is to fight for these values and support the candidates that best represent them.

The choice is obvious."

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From :

https://plus.google.com/+YASalsaDetroit/posts

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David Bee originally shared to Bernie Sanders For U.S. President! #mydailybernie:

The graphic below is from another source: here ☛ https://goo.gl/L7m80m

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Data source: UNICEF

American children are on average worse off than children in Western Europe

barely better off than their counterparts in the Baltic states and the former Yugoslavia,

- United Nation’s Children's Fund (UNICEF) –

The report, which compares kids in 29 Western countries,

measures well-being across five metrics:

material well-being,

health and safety,

behaviors and risks,

housing and environment,

education.

It ranks the United States in the bottom third on all five measures

and particularly low on education and poverty.

The United States is joined at the bottom by “emerging” European economies,

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As noted earlier, one of the report's more alarming findings for the United States

is the degree to which income inequality has increased the population of children who grow up in relative poverty .

Economists rate the U.S. economy as one of the most unequal in the Western world.

… the report, means that significant numbers of American children are so much worse off than the average Greek or Slovakian child as to bring the overall U.S. average beneath those other, relatively less wealthy and developed countries.

Here's a chart

showing the rankings, overall and across the five key metrics, for 29 countries:

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Data: UNICEF

… the United States did do well on some comparative metrics.

( ? ) American kids get more exercise than almost any others studied in the report,

but they’re still, by far, the most overweight.

(Chalk that up to American calorie consumption, which is also one of the world’s highest.)

American kids also are the least likely to drink alcohol –

a finding that matches long-standing alcohol consumption patterns of American adults.

According to the World Health Organization, Americans ages 15 and up have consumed far less alcohol than their counterparts abroad for decades.